Revealed: how the US and UK tried to spin the David Hicks case

Natalie O'brien

The British government wanted information from Australian officials to help portray then Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks as a "danger to society" to help block his bid for citizenship, at the same time the US government was trying to manipulate public opinion through two of the Australia's mainstream daily newspapers about its treatment of detainees.

The attempts by foreign governments to influence public opinion in Britain and Australia have come to light with the release of documents under freedom of information from the US State Department.

"Significant bilateral problem": David Hicks was imprisoned for more than five years. Photo: Kate Geraghty

Sydney-based human rights campaigner Aloysia Brooks obtained a series of diplomatic cables from the US Embassies in Canberra and London that captured messages being sent to Washington about Mr Hicks and the issue of the treatment of Guantanamo Bay detainees.

They came on the back of the release of the so-called CIA torture report last week that revealed the agency used far more brutal interrogation methods against terrorism suspects than previously disclosed, in secret prisons around the world.

Mr Hicks was captured in Afghanistan in late 2001 and turned over to the US, before being taken to Guantanamo Bay in the first batch of prisoners to be incarcerated there. He was held for 5½ years before being convinced to give an Alford Plea - which is not recognised in Australia - which meant that he did not make any admissions.

He was convicted of providing material support for terrorism and allowed to return to Australia to serve a 7½-month sentence. He was also gagged from speaking for one year. He is appealing that conviction and after similar convictions have been overturned, his lawyer Stephen Kenny from Camatta Lempens has said the overturning of the conviction should be a purely administrative matter.

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Now, the previously confidential cables obtained by Dr Brooks reveal the political machinations taking place behinds the scenes in early 2007 as Australia headed for a federal election and Mr Hicks was still being held in Guantanamo Bay without charge, prompting growing outrage among Australians.

The British government had been desperate to quash Mr Hicks attempts to gain citizenship, and had asked Australia and the US if they could "provide any information ... which could provide a broader portrait of Hicks as a danger to society and of his past, including his alleged travel to Pakistan and Kosovo".

A spokesman for the British Embassy in Canberra said "we do not comment on individual cases".

At the same time the US government was keenly aware its image was being damaged because of what was seen as the "incomprehensible delay in bringing him to trial" and the Hicks case was damaging Howard politically. The cables warned that what had been a "manageable irritant" between allies was becoming a "significant bilateral problem".

The communications also reveal that the US embassy had undertaken "public diplomacy efforts to counter misinformation about the Military Commissions Act and to get out a more positive message here about treatment of detainees at Guantanamo".

In a cable from the US embassy in Canberra to Washington, detailing the media frenzy that was building about Mr Hicks ahead of the 2007 election, they say "we have so far been unsuccessful in convincing either the left-leaning Melbourne Age newspaper or the conservative, generally pro-US The Australian newspaper to publish in its entirety an op-ed drafted by the Ambassador that defends US handling of detainees".

Dr Brooks, who has been fighting for years to get access to records about Mr Hicks detention as well as what information about what the government knew about his treatment, said the documents reveal the politics involved in the laying a charge against Mr Hicks and said he was being used as a "political football".

"It also shows the lengths they were going to, to try and promote a pro-Guantanamo image," she said.

Dr Brooks also said the cables clearly state that Mr Hicks had not broken any Australian laws.

A spokesman for the former prime minister John Howard said that Mr Howard, at the time, quiet openly urged the United States government to bring Mr Hicks to trial as soon as possible. "Any suggestion that Mr Hicks was used as a political football is quite wrong," he said.

"In the absence of progress ... there is a distinct possibility that PM Howard who must call for a national election later this year will ask the United States to release Hicks and permit his return to Australia."